452 
WED ORL 
| Marcu 11, 1897 
Tue Technical Education Board of the London County 
Council invite applications for a scholarship in sanitary science 
of the value ot £150 a year, tenable in the pathological labora- 
tory of Claybury Asylum. Candidates must be ordinarily resi- 
dent within the administrative county of London. In making 
the selection, preference will be given to a candidate who is a 
qualified and registered practitioner, and has completed his 
academic course. The scholar must make such arrangements 
as to residence as will enable him to devote his whole time to 
the study of the working and effects of preventable, social and 
industrial causes of insanity. 
Dr. M. W. NENCKI, director of the chemical department of 
the Institute for Experimental Medicine, has, states the Brztzsh 
Medical Journal, recently celebrated the twenty-fifth anniversary 
of his appointment as Professor of Pathological Chemistry in the 
University of St. Petersburg. He was presented by his friends 
and former pupils with a Festschrift, which contains, amongst 
others, papers by Prof. Thomas Arthus, of Freiburg, and Dr. 
Kostanecky, of Bern. The Council of the University of Kasan, 
with which Prof. Nencki was connected at the commencement 
of his professional career, has elected him honorary member, a 
distinction which is considered a very high compliment in 
Russia. 
THE following are among recent announcements :—Dr. 
Pompecki to be curator of the State palzeontological collection 
at Munich; Dr. Noll to be professor of botany at Bonn; 
Prof. E. Wernicke has been invited to the chair of hygiene at 
Marburg; Dr. Franz Lafar has been invited to the chair of 
bacteriology and fermentation-physiology in the Technical High 
School at Vienna ; Mr. Charles D. Walcott to be acting assistant 
secretary in charge of the U.S. National Museum ; Mr. Richard 
Rathbun to be assistant secretary in charge of the office and ex- 
changes of the Smithsonian Institution; Dr. Julius Aparicio to 
be director of the meteorological and astronomical observatory at 
San Salvador ; Prof. J. Franz to be director of the observatory 
at Breslau, and professor of astronomy in the University there. 
May the many instances of large benefactions to research and 
education in America, recorded by Mr. George Iles in Zhe 
Century for March, act persuasively upon millionaires, and 
stimulate a desire to emulate the example. Mr. Iles points 
out that the first large gift for original research in the United 
States is that of 500,000 dols. received in 1838 as a bequest 
from James Smithson, an Englishman, who, strange to say, 
never set his foot in America; in 1891, another Englishman, 
Thomas Hodgkins, gave the Smithsonian Institution 200,000 
dols. more. In bringing the results of research to the service 
of the public on the lines of an industrial university, the Pratt 
Institute in Brooklyn is instanced as doing notable work. With 
its endowment of 3,500,000 dols. it represents a total gift [of 
about 4,000,000 dols. On a plane of yet higher educational 
activity stands the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, to 
which Johns Hopkins gave 3,500,000 dols. The University of 
Chicago, opened but five years ago, has already received about 
12,000,000 dols. as gifts, more than half of it being from Mr. 
John D. Rockefeller. In 1895 Mr. Rockefeller offered this 
University 2,000,000 dols. in addition to his previous gifts, on 
condition that an equal sum should be given to it by 1900. His 
offer has already resulted in a gift of 1,025,000 dols. from Miss 
Helen Culver. Mr. Ezra Cornell gave; 670,000 dols. to the 
University which bears his name, and the Hon. Henry W. 
Sage 1,171,000 dols. The cash gifts to the University 
aggregate 2,738,000 dols. Columbia University, New York, 
asked for 4,000,000 dols. to erect new buildings when removing 
to a new site. It received 350,000 dols. from Mr. W. C. 
Schermerhorn for a natural science building ; 1,000,000 dols. 
from President Seth Low for a library ; and 400,000 dols. from 
members of the Havemeyer family for the erection of a memorial 
hall. Before the new wants of the university had been declared, 
its medical departments received 1,970,000 dols. from the 
Vanderbilt family. Mr. Anthony J. Drexel gave more than 
3,000,000 dols. for the foundation of the Drexel College of art, 
science, and industry ; Mr. Marshall Field gave 1,000,000 dols. 
for the foundation of the Field Columbian Museum; Clark 
University was established by a gift of 1,500,000 dols. from Mr. 
Jonas G. Clark ; and many other instances of generosity are 
mentioned by Mr. Iles. It is pointed out, however, that 
American science still awaits its adequate physical and chemical 
laboratory for pure research. Judging from the generous spirit 
shown by past gifts, the waiting time should not be long. 
NO, 1428, VOL. 55] 
SOCIETIES AND ACADEMIES. 
Lonpon. 
Royal Society, February 18.—‘‘On the Significance o 
Bravais’ Formule for Regression, &c., in the case of Skew 
Correlation.” By G. Udny Yule. Received December 14, 1896. 
If two variables, x and y, be normally correlated, the means 
of arrays of x’s associated with successive types of y’s lie on a 
straight line, called the line of regression. In the general case 
of skew correlation, this straight line becomes a curve. If, 
however, a straight line be fitted to the curve by the method 
of least squares, the equation to this straight line is identical 
with the equation to the ‘line of regression” of normal cor- 
relation. Hence the formule given by Bravais still remain 
significant whatever the form of the correlation, If the re- 
gression of x on y be positive, large values of « correspond, 
on the whole, to large values of y, and wzce versd. The ex- 
pression for the standard deviation of the array in normal 
correlation is, in the general case, interpretable as the standard 
deviation of the whole series of observations from the line of 
regression. j 
Similar interpretations hold good for the cases of correlation 
between three, four, or more variables. 
“On the Iron Lines present in the Hottest Stars. Preliminary 
Note.”” By J. Norman Lockyer, C.B., F.R.S. Received 
January 25. 
In continuation of investigations communicated to the Royal 
Society in 1879 (Roy. Soc. Proc. 1879, vol. xxx. p. 22), and 
1881 (¢iza., 1881, vol. xxxii. p. 204), on the effect of high- 
tension electricity on the line spectra of metals, I have recently 
used a more powerful current and larger jar surface than that I 
formerly employed. 
The former work consisted in noting (1) the lines brightened 
in passing a spark in a flame charged with metallic vapours, and 
(2) the lines brightened on passing from the arc to the spark. 
It was found, in the case of iron, that two lines in the 
visible spectrum at 4924°1 and 5018-6, on Rowland’s scale, 
were greatly enhanced in brightness, and were very important 
in solar phenomena. 
The recent work carries these results into the photographic 
“region. The result is interesting and important, since seven addi- 
tional lines have been found to have their brightness enhanced 
at the highest temperature. These, as well as the two pre- 
viously observed, are shown in the following table, which also 
indicates the behaviour of the lines under different conditions, as 
observed by Kayser and Runge (K. and R.) and myself (L.) in 
the arc, and by Thalén (T.) and myself in sparks :— 
Lines of Iron which are enhanced in Spark. 
| 
a Mrave Intensity aca | Length in | Intensity nee 
length. in i(K and R). Be(Wh te Spa (L). 
flame. Neier Max.=10. | Max.=10. Masiano. 
4233°3 — I — — 4 
4508°5 = 1 = -- 4 
45155 — I — -- 4 
45204 — I = - 2 
45228 a I 3 ey 4 
4549°6 = 4 5 -- 6, 
4584°0 = 2 4 = i} 
4924°1 _— I 3 6 6 
>. | 
50186 = Fe 6 
Combining this 
concluding that, in a space heated to the ‘temperature of the 
hottest spark, and shielded from a lower temperature, these 
lines would constitute the spectrum of iron. 
Defining the hottest stars as those in which the ultra-violet 
spectrum is most extended, it is known that absorption is indi- 
cated by few lines only. In these stars iron is practically 
represented by the enhanced lines alone ; those which build up, 
for the most part, the arc spectrum are almost or entirely 
absent. 
The intensities o: the enhanced lines in some of the hottest 
stars are shown in the appended diagram, and for the sake of com- 
parison, the behaviour of a group of three lines which are among 
the most marked at lower temperatures, is also indicated. In 
